Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to the field of computers and similar technologies, and in particular to software utilized in this field. Still more particularly, it relates to a method, system and computer-usable medium for using culture-related information for detecting spam.
Description of the Related Art
Electronic communications have become a part of everyday life and currently include electronic mail (email), instant messaging (IM), online chat, or Short Message Service (SMS) messages. Other forms of electronic communications include posts on social network sites, online forums, blogs and microblogs. All of these are conducive to the delivery of spam (i.e., unsolicited, often bulk generated, electronic communications), which can be harmful to users in many ways. For example, a user's private information may be stolen, their accounts can be hacked, their financial information may be compromised, or their public image may be harmed.
In a common scenario, a user receives an email message with an unfamiliar URL in the message body from someone posing as a friend or colleague. As a result, the user may implicitly trust the URL and click on it, resulting in a virus or other malware being installed on their computer. It is also becoming increasingly common for user accounts in social network environments to be hacked and then used to broadcast spam to the accounts of the user's “friends.”
Existing approaches to detecting spam include the use of heuristics, word analysis, “black” lists, and “white” lists. As an example, various email programs allow users to filter email messages from known senders of spam and file them in a “bulk” or “deleted” box instead of the user's “in” box. Other examples of filtering approaches include domain name system blacklist (DNSBL), uniform resource identifier blacklist (URIBL), right-hand side blacklist (RHSBL), dynamic real-time block list (DynRBL) and domain name system whitelist (DNSWL). However, such approaches fail to take into account known cultural aspects, such as the sender's and recipient's respective ethnic background, language, religion, social status, and so forth.